Split Second
by Kintatsu
Summary: This was the result of, not so much Fridge Horror, as much as Watching-Way-Too-Closely-Horror about episode three.  Also, Ruki has mild PTSD.
1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note: **This was inspired by a single frame in episode 3. In going through the scene, frame-by-frame, in an attempt to reassure myself that I did _not _just see that, I instead confirmed that I did, in fact, see _exactly _what I thought I saw.

**Disclaimer: **I am not Chiaka Konaka. I am not a member of Bandai. I'm not even a dubber/subber. I _do not _own Digimon: Tamers.

\_/-~=o=~-\_/

One year after everything, Makino Ruki slept fitfully, her dreams plagued by a memory:

_She was in a parking garage, Renamon dodging Guilmon's fireballs, Takato asking her why she keeps coming after him, Jianliang yelling for the fight to stop. During the chaos, Terriermon wanders into the line of fire._

_A moment of realization. A bright light. Terriermon is replaced by a maniacally laughing, trigger-happy Garugomon. Everyone else gets under cover. She herself tries to get to Renamon. Garugomon sees her, and, twenty feet away, pins her to a pillar. She freezes._

_Out the corner of her eye, she sees Renamon and Guilmon approaching at speed... she thinks. Everything has slowed down, like time is swimming through clear glue. She can see each and every one of Garugomon's hairs..._

_Again her life flashes before her eyes as she sees that which she saw the first time, that which she will see again and again and again, until memory fades to insignificance: as Guilmon tackles him, Garugomon __**fires**__._

With a choked sob, Ruki awakens.

\_/-~=o=~-\_/

**Author's Note: **Some of you might be wondering why I have Ruki dreaming of this scene instead of the D-Reaper. My answer to you is: the D-Reaper is, essentially, an eldritch abomination. Its method of killing you would be beyond your ability to grasp, unless you took the time to _think_ about it. A bullet, on the other hand? All too real. And for a 13, or 10, depending on your audio, year-old girl who is both sane and healthy? _More_ than enough reason to _get the hell out of the game_. Subsequent episodes make a _lot_ more sense now, don't you think?

Now, that button down there, the one that says _Review_? _Press it._


	2. Chapter 2

**Author's Note: **Yes, I know, the fic was marked "Complete." I blame the Israfels. They gave me more inspiration. Frakking angels...

Anyway, this is a continuation featuring Ruki's thoughts on the matter (sort of an expansion of the second AN). I see her mother as the type to get Ruki a therapist after seeing the Big Red Blob of DOOM, and realizing that she has no frame of reference to help her daughter with... stuff.

**Disclaimer: **See previous chapter.

\_/-~=o=~-\_/

"So, out of all the... situations... you wound up in, why does _that _moment stick out?"

Ruki drew one knee up to her chest as she considered how to word her answer. It was an interesting question, though she'd never asked it of herself. Why, out of multiple skirmishes with wild Digimon, a head-to-head with a digital god, and a desperate siege against a Lovecraftian horror, did simply being nearly shot keep waking her up at night?

… Now there was a thought.

"It was simple. I didn't have to think about it to realize that I was... that I almost died, and I was helpless. All the other times, things were either too weird for me to really see how much danger I was in, or I could do something, fight back."

Her voice cracked at one point.

"But that time? Renamon was at the other end of the garage, I'd already seen what those bullets could do to metal and concrete, and... I saw the muzzle flash..."

The woman across from her leaned forward at this. "You saw the muzzle flash?"

"Right when Guilmon tackled Garugomon. If he'd been... if he hadn't..."

Ruki was hyperventilating now, trying to hold herself together. It wasn't quite working.

"If he'd been just a little slower, I'd be dead right now, and so would everyone else."

\_/-~=o=~-\_/

**Author's Note: **How's _that_ for Fridge Horror? And let's be honest here: she's saved the other tamers so many times that everything _would_ have gone to hell without her.


End file.
